As we finish the last day of 2008 the reality of the matter is that 18 months have passed since red lights came on and warning sirens sounded in the summer of 2007. Letting the air out of the mortgage bubble, and subsequently starting the collapse of Wall Street, the summer of 2007 was only a prelude to bigger unthinkable things to come.
Archive for » December, 2008 «
Category: Editorial, Opinion
5 Comments
Competition is a never-ending race of everyone against everyone else. Everyone is a worker, but everyone is a consumer too. As we wrap up Mortgage Blues for another year 2008 has been chaos to some, but very predictable to others. When we told an investor group to dump Fannie and Freddie we were told our predictions could never happen.
Category: Editorial
Leave a Comment
It is time for a review of where our taxpayer dollar went, aka the TARP program. We don’t even want to discuss Hope Now and other tries at solving a problem with no solution. But, you say, there is a viable solution. Perhaps, but the greed that got us into this must be followed by a second round of greed. After that we might – just maybe – solve the problem. Of the $188 billion paid out by TARP, a corresponding $1.6 billion went to executives of the 116 banks that took money so far.
Category: Government Positions
Leave a Comment
If subprime issues and tainted paper sold around the world didn’t start a global economic war a recent move might do so. Investors in bank debt are threatening to boycott lenders that follow Deutsche Bank in breaking an unwritten rule and failing to exercise a call option on subordinated debt.
In a coordinated action, angry bond investors are writing to bank treasurers and investor relations heads telling them that any failure to exercise a call option will be considered a breach of trust that could cause all the issuer’s debt to be shunned.
Category: International
Leave a Comment
A state court helped subprime borrowers and homeowners with onerous mortgages, including Alt-A and jumbo mortgages. The help probably did more than restructuring and individual loan modifications have done thus far. This may mean real relief, rather than what we have seen from many mortgage companies. Just putting the past due amount on the end of a loan is not much help at all.
Category: Lawsuits
Leave a Comment
